BimmerPost Caught Playing Favorites Among Vendors. Don't Trust Everything You Read

The BMW forum game is honestly pretty twisted. Full of back room deals with vendors struggling for dominance of one another attempting to get every last dollar from every last user. Some may say this is business but on some websites this is how they extort money. Pay enough to get preferential treatment and your competition will find their posts are deleted, fans silenced, censorship is employed, and those who speak out are banned. This is exactly what ModBargains is experiencing.




ModBargains was forced off of BimmerPost due to underhanded tactics and came to BimmerBoost looking for an open and fair atmosphere. This website is known by its users and vendors alike as the place that does not play BimmerPost's censorship and banning games favoring certain vendors. To put it mildly, you can buy yourself a favorable position on BimmerPost whereas here we expect vendors to stand on their own two feet. So if a user has something to say, and that something may be bad, we favor the vendor making things right with their customer. This certainly doesn't help the bottom line but respect isn't something you can buy. It's these dirty politics that are one of the main reasons that BimmerBoost and the GermanBoost network exist and are thriving.

So what happened? ModBargains was on the wrong end of these politics and now any positive reviews of them are being systematically deleted to make it appear as if nobody has anything postiive to say about them. Additionally, if you are on BimmerPost and wish to say something positive about ModBargains, you will be banned and the name will come up censored. The right to free speech or even at the very least for members of the BMW community to voice their pleasure with a vendor are not things allowed if it isn't a vendor who is paying off the right person the right amount in the right manner.

This was sent to BimmerBoost from a disgruntled BimmerPost member who attempted to say he was happy with ModBargains:

"You didn't hear this from me... I don't want bimmerpost knowing I am telling you about it, but I read your thread about shift s3ctor sponsorship and thought you would be interested in hearing this.

I guess they are now censoring their own forum users. Anytime somebody posts the word "modbargains" it appears as "***********" instead. Popular threads mentioning ModBargains are censored and then closed or completely deleted. example: http://www.e90post.com/forums/showthread.php?t=769987

They also are deleting positive customer review threads in the feedback section and keeping the negative review threads on their forum. There are over 100 positive customer reviews in the last 3 months that have been deleted.

There's an old saying... "Give a person enough rope and they just might hang themselves." That might apply here... censoring the internet like this is simply not acceptable... especially a public forum. I think it's only a matter of time before people notice. A lot of the customers don't know their positive reviews have been deleted. Many of them haven't realized their posts are being censored and closed...

Here is another thread where you notice a user listing his mods and ModBargains is censored out so the user isn't allowed to say where he got his mods he is happy with: http://www.1addicts.com/forums/showthread.php?t=618868"


So how about that? Hundreds of positive reviews are being deleted yet a handful of negative reviews, which obviously ModBargains won't even be allowed to address, are allowed to stay in order to sway public perception and the users are being treated like blind sheep. Is this a power ploy by another vendor in SoCal who goes head to head with ModBargains? You be the judge. Regardless, it's happening and it's sickening.

BimmerBoost does not like having to link to its competition but there are times you put pride aside and do what is right. In this case, letting people know how business is conducted "over there" versus here and how it affects you, the enthusiast.

BimmerBoost isn't afraid of BimmerPost and isn't afraid to make these issues known. We are the voice of the BMW community and this kind of thing won't be silenced. BimmerBoost thanks its vendors who want to help change the currently corrupt climate that exists in the BMW forum world. And if we have to do it ourselves then so be it.
This article was originally published in forum thread: A peak behind the scenes of BMW Forum politics - BimmerPost targets ModBargains started by Sticky View original post

For years I've supported and purchased from Modbargains. Not because they were always the cheapest option or the fastest shipper.. but they always stood by their products and, in the event anything went wrong, they'd make it right. Time and time again I've seen other vendors fail to meet their promises of QC, shipping times, or other areas... and that's fine. Mistakes happen and no company is perfect. But Modbargains has always gone above and beyond to ensure that they rectified issues and delivered the highest quality support available. To the team at Modbargains, I'm sorry to see that websites that should serve as hubs of freedom of speech (and a place to turn to for advise on vendors) can't even offer a level playing field.

Are your knees bruised?

That's fucked up. ModBargains is an awesome sponsor. I still hate Matt over at Umnitza though. Jlevi was a nice guy though.

Huh, wow. Poor modbargains. I've never had anything but positive experiences with them.

This kind of thing does go on on many BMW forums. I've heard of this type of thing on bf.c, M3forum, and now Bimmerpost. It sucks, but I can't say that I'm surprised.

What really sucks is that Bimmerpost has become a premier website for some of the new generations- and they are so shitty at the same time.

Hopefully some people will migrate to Bimmerfest and F30driver.

I have always had good experiences with Modbargains

Furthermore, they were extremely helpful and enthusiastic in the event that I had a specific question about a product or shipping.

If anything I wish they would do this to shady POS Umnitza.

Originally Posted by NOVAbimmer

Huh, wow. Poor modbargains. I've never had anything but positive experiences with them.

i have ordered from them,theyre great. i order things offline all the time and the positive experience i had with them really stuck in my memory

Although link title should be "A peek behind ..."

Could what they are doing be classified as libel?

Ordered a few things back in the day, good vendor.

Don't imagine this is limited to the BMW community.

Regardless of how much money I've spent with Jurrian at ModBargains, he has always been a top notch guy who has done everything and MORE to ensure my transactions went as smooth as possible.

My BBK made it to me in two days after my payment cleared and they even purchased the kit from the manufaturer beforehand for me, just based on trust as a repeat customer.. That says a lot, especially when ModBargains is shelling out $2000+ to purchase an item that the customer(me) may have not picked up.

People who know.....know! ModBargains has been around for a long time. They have an established rep. Even Bimmerpost can't tarnish that.

fwiw, modbargains was caught stealing CC information. Multiple members who placed orders through modbargains found strange charges on their CC statements and traced it back to modbargains.

Wow... what the hell? ModBargains.com has made me happy in the times I've purchased things from them.

One of the reasons I'm on here and still on here is cuz they don't play games like that. I initially started on a bunch of BMW websites, but most are garbage with policies like that. I've never bought anything from modbargains, but that kinda behavior sounds about right from bmwpost and other forums.

i never bought anything from ModBargains. They had a Black Friday "deal" which wasnt even a deal. Emailed other sponsors and they were able to easily undercut ModBargain's advertised Black Friday deals.

people still use middleman vendors? rofl. just go straight through the company.

Originally Posted by zhp43867

This kind of thing does go on on many BMW forums. I've heard of this type of thing on bf.c, M3forum, and now Bimmerpost. It sucks, but I can't say that I'm surprised.

word... i was shocked when i first heard that sponsors had these kinds of problems with forums. but no matter how much you try to hide it, everyone eventually finds out.

Originally Posted by B_Cyrus

Could what they are doing be classified as libel?

Jason is a lawyer, I'm sure he has researched what he can/can't do.

I thought this thread was locked? lol